OP-ED: Langworthy Sponsors Indirect Poll Tax

Republican candidate for Congress questions the motives of the SAVE Act

By Jim King,

In his August 27^th pseudo town hall meeting, Nick Langworth tried to justify vote suppression as remedy for voter fraud.  Voter fraud, due to existing law, is almost non-existent.  His vote suppression method is an indirect poll tax.  Jim Crow era direct poll taxes were prohibited by the 24^th Amendment because they are designed to suppress the vote. 

Langworthy co-sponsored the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act or the SAVE Act (H.R. 22).  In his “town hall” he tried to say that its requirements are the same as those required for the REAL ID.  They are not.  The SAVE Act, among other things, requires at voter registration proof of citizenship: a passport or birth certificate or the equivalent. 

Valid documents are expensive, time consuming, and challenging to acquire.  For example:

A new passport has a Federal fee of $165.  Add on the costs of lost work time, photographs, supporting documents, transportation, and mailing. 

A certified birth certificate from Buffalo requires a government ID (driver’s license $70, non-driver ID $14) and a $10 fee.  There is a more expensive on-line option.  (If you had a sealed adoption, there are additional complications.)  Add the costs of lost work time, transportation, and perhaps internet access.  Other jurisdictions are similar; many are more complicated and expensive.

The potential voter who has limited resources, or is at the moment politically disinterested, will be disenfranchised.  That is intentional.

Why would Langworthy want to suppress their vote?  It is because, when aroused, those who watch their pennies and the political snoozers vote their pocket-books.  The fiscally irresponsible “Big Beautiful Bill’s” financial impacts will occur after the 2026 mid-term election.  He does not want the poor or the snoozers to vote in the 2028 general election.  Langworthy’s job is at stake.

Jim King, Owego NY

Republican candidate for Congress